The present invention relates to an automatic single crystal ingot disconnector to be remote-controlled and used with a single crystal pulling apparatus, or more particularly to such a disconnector which is operated by remote controlling to automatically sever a single crystal ingot at the neck which ingot is pulled up in the single crystal pulling apparatus.
Single crystal materials such as single crystal silicon can be obtained, for instance, by the Czochralski (CZ) method, which utilizes a single crystal pulling apparatus, which is an apparatus for growing and pulling up a single crystal ingot from a molten liquid of a polycrystal substance. This apparatus comprises a main chamber wherein the single crystal is grown, and in this main chamber are housed a crucible for containing polycrystal substance, a heater arranged to surround the crucible, and a heat insulator arranged to surround the heater. Beneath the main chamber are provided mechanisms for rotating the crucible to control the uniformity of the heat flux in the melt during the crystal growing process. Rising above the main chamber is a towering structure of a crystal pull chamber which is an upright, substantially cylindrical enclosure terminating in an upper structure of a crystal pulling mechanism. The single crystal ingot which is grown and raised high in the main chamber is brought up into the pull chamber.
In the single crystal pulling apparatus, the single crystal is caused to grow from the lower tip of a seed crystal which is attached to the lower end of a pull device such as a wire. As the seed crystal is rotated and brought up higher slowly, the single crystal is grown longer from the seed tip and an extremely thin needle-like portion (hereinafter referred to as a "neck") is firstly formed, and the diameter of the single crystal gets larger as the length of the the single crystal increases until the diameter becomes a predetermined size. In order to remove the thus grown crystal ingot from the single crystal pulling apparatus, it is necessary to disconnect the ingot from the pull device at the neck.